Design of an Exterior-Rotor Switched Reluctance Motor for a Washing Machine Application

Washing machines have revolutionized the way we manage our laundry, making the task of cleaning clothes easier and more efficient. This paper attempts to design an exterior rotor Switched Reluctance Motor (SRM) for a direct-drive washing machine application. The mechanical design constraints and operating points on the torque speed curve were defined from an exhaustive literature study of the existing washing machine motor designs. The static and dynamic characteristics of the designed motor are presented. Genetic Algorithm optimization was used to calculate the conduction angles for the dominant operating points in the washing and spin cycles. The loss analysis of the motor was also conducted to analyze the performance of the designed SRM.